There they sat before their hut, under the shade of the tree, feeling and looking disconsolate enough. It was the eighth day since they had again taken possession of it, and not once had they seen Umhleswa during that period. A good provision of manioc flour had been conveyed to them. Their shot guns had supplied them with small game, for they dared not venture far from the kraal, for fear of awakening suspicion, and even as it was, found themselves closely watched.
The two had just finished a supper they had cooked themselves. They were both fully armed, and near them, within reach of their hands, lay their rifles. The sun had set, the air was warm, and the breeze scarcely moved the leaves of the tree overhead. Before them lay stretched the plain with its belt of forest-land, and in the distance the faint line of the Matopo hills. Close by, the densely populated kraal, the blue smoke from many fires curling up into the air. The hum of the bees was heard as they winged their way homewards towards the forest, and above them in the tree the cries of the parrots, as they quarrelled before composing themselves to sleep. Rising and shading his face with his hand, Hughes gazed in the direction of the kraal. A solitary figure was wending his way through the huts, coming towards them.
“It’s weary work this,” he remarked, as he sat down again with a sigh, “keeping watch and watch all day, and dividing the night between us, too. It’s a weary life. What can have become of Masheesh?”
“The Matabele brave has cared for his own skin, and has fled to the mountains, like the rest of them,” replied the missionary.
“I thought better of him,” said Hughes, absently, “and I am sorry I was wrong.”
“Look, is not that Umhleswa coming towards us,” said Wyzinski. “God grant he may have made arrangements for our journey.”
“It is he, indeed,” replied the other, as he rose to heap fresh branches on the fire.
Slowly the chief stalked along, apparently not caring where he went, stopped opposite the two, and then, as if perceiving them for the first time, approached and squatted by the fire.
Umhleswa’s evil nature was now too well-known, for this seeming carelessness to dupe them.
“Have my white brethren all they can want?” he asked.